This invention relates generally to agricultural forage harvesting machines, and, more particularly, to a suspension mechanism for a gathering rake wheel used on a crop pickup assembly.
Some round baler use pickups having the same width as that of the bale chamber. Gathering wheels are commonly used and positioned outboard of the ends of such pickups to increase the gathering width of these relatively narrower pickups. Round baler pickups are required to be moveable between operating and transport positions; such movement is often accomplished by rotating the pickup about a transverse pivot axis. Pickup movement has resulted in gathering wheels being most frequently mounted on the baler frame; however, such a location is not ideal as it places the gathering wheel rearward than ideal. Another solution is to attach the gathering wheels directly to the pickup for movement therewith. The disadvantage in this configuration is that the degree of pickup rotation may be limited due to interferences between the gathering wheels and the baler frame and/or shields which may result in damage to the pickup during transport as the pickup assembly cannot be sufficiently rotated to provide necessary ground clearance.
It would be advantageous to have an improved suspension mechanism for attaching a crop gathering wheel to a crop pickup assembly that enables the gathering wheel to be raised and lowered at a rate differing from that of the pickup assembly. The mechanism would enable the pickup assembly to be raised a greater amount relative to the gathering wheel thereby allowing the pickup to be raised to an extent to provide necessary ground clearance without causing the gathering wheel to interfere with the machine chassis.